Close This Thread

[Ycore Rixle]

As I agree completely with Mythusmage's take on this matter, and he is spot on, all I can say to your query addressed to him is this: the aim of the RPG is not to eventually create a story. Any story that evolves during or after play is a bonus that is developed by the participants who enjoyed playing a game.

Gary, in another thread recently Mythusmage stated that he was trying to make RPGs more than a game. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on that.

As for the dispute at hand, I find Mythusmage's arguments murky and ill-defined. I believe he has fatally confused storytelling with story writing. I also believe that he is building a straw-man argument by placing story at the center of the RPG experience and then attacking it. While storytelling is not at the center of the RPG experience (again, the center is gameplay), it seems counter-intuitive in the extreme, risible in fact, to suggest that storytelling does not have a place in RPGs.

 

[Baron Opal]

So then, sequential story telling isn't really story telling because one specific person doesn't know the whole sotry beforehand?

 

[mythusmage]

Reducing complex subjects to statements such as "All X are Y" is misleading and, in the end, not at all helpful to understanding the complexity of our hobby, and certainly not helpful for embracing the diversity of approaches to be found within our hobby.

Go looking for "Narrativist RPGs," and you'll discover a slew of games whose mechanics are all geared toward character, characterization, mood, themes, plot hooks, plot twists, flashbacks, allusion, etc. (and I'm not talking about White Wolf). The stated point of these games is to create a story. Everyone at the table works toward that goal. If they're having fun, they're not wrong.

Mythusmage, what concerns me about your theories is that (from what little you've revealed of them), they are always exclusionary. You're always making sweeping statements about what role-playing games are and what they aren't. I have yet to see an admission that the experiences of other people may differ from your own.

Anyone can draw a line to separate people. It's not at all innovative to do so.

Narrativist RPGs: The fact there are Narrativist RPGs around does nothing to support the claim RPGs are a form of story telling. They can be used to create stories (any RPG can be used to create stories) but that does not mean they are stories. Story comes after when the GM and/or players talk about the adventure played in.

Theory: Sorry, it's still a work in progress. Call it more an hypothesis that's going through the testing stage. As to experience. Very often how one experiences an event, and interprets that experience, depends on how one sees the world or a part thereof. Seeing RPGs as a form of story-telling will tend to bias how one interprets the RPG experience. One your sure Man is the only hominid that got to North America under his own power, the sasquatch becomes an exceedingly unlikely beast.

No doubt some have experienced an RPG session as a round of interactive story-telling. Because they expected a round of interactive story-telling. Expectation influences experience and conclusion. Something researchers for example must guard against when doing research.

The next time you play do this; watch the game carefully and take note of what does go on. Do your best to set aside what you think is going on and focus on what is. Prediction: You will find that the events as they occur are more like real life than like any story you've ever read. More like real life in that the outcomes cannot be predicted with any reliability.

 

[mythusmage]

Gary, in another thread recently Mythusmage stated that he was trying to make RPGs more than a game. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on that.

As for the dispute at hand, I find Mythusmage's arguments murky and ill-defined. I believe he has fatally confused storytelling with story writing. I also believe that he is building a straw-man argument by placing story at the center of the RPG experience and then attacking it. While storytelling is not at the center of the RPG experience (again, the center is gameplay), it seems counter-intuitive in the extreme, risible in fact, to suggest that storytelling does not have a place in RPGs.

Ycore Rixie,

RPGs do not model story, they model real life. The events in an RPG are imaginary, but they more closely resemble real life than story.

BTW, when you write a story you are telling a story. You cannot write a story without telling it. What happens in an adventure can be used when telling the story, but while the adventure is being played story plays no part. Story comes into the picture when you recount for others what happened in your adventure.

Storytelling certainly has a place in RPG, but it's not during actual play. But that's for another post, once I've had a just to catch up.

 

[mythusmage]

This, however, is the core of your fallacious argument: you are adamantly against railroading, as, admittedly, are most experienced RPGers. However, by claiming that a roleplaying game cannot be predetermined, you are stating that railroading is, not wrong, but impossible.

At the bare minimum, an RPG can be a pure 100% railroad fest with the PCs moved from A to B to C with no real input on the outcome. That may make for a less than ideal session, but it's hardly impossible.

In fact, if it weren't possible, I daresay you would never have become adamantly against it. One rarely hears a person adamantly against flying pigs.

"Good RPG sessions," in your opinion and that of most experienced players and GMs, may lack predetermined events; "RPG sessions" may, however, include them.

Before I do a substantial reply to this post I need to know one thing; how do you understand railroading?

 

[mythusmage]

Well, Cutter, I'm guessing mythusmage has put us on his ignore list because we are challenging his view that he didn't just invent the idea of simulationist play the other day. I'm guessing Sweeny and Umbran will join the list soon. Of course, you're being more offensive than I by repeatedly directing him to a website where people are and have been discussing his idea with greater sophistication for several years. Still, say what you will about the tenets of exclusionary simulationism, at least it's an ethos.

Nevertheless, because I have a major paper I have to submit in two weeks, I feel called upon to waste 15 minutes responding to mythusmage's "points" anyway.

First of all, mythusmage, perhaps you could tell us why Story Now games are not what they claim to be. How do you explain games like Buffy that include mechanics that act directly on story? Are these games, like the ones that include battle maps, not RPGs either? Most RPGs are only story post-facto; a subset are stories both post-facto and during play.Mythusmage, at this point I'm just going to come out and say it: you are acting like a megalomaniac. You state that something that appears to be a preference a "should be" is not really a preference but a fact, an absolute truth. What proof do you offer of this? You state "it is my considered opinion that this is the best way." The fact that you find a particular way or working is most effective in your own life does not make this way of working an absolute universal fact for everyone else in the world. You sound absolutely pathological here conflating your "considered opinion" about what is "best" with an unalterable universal fact. Step back and take a look at how you are communicating.So, it's bad for people to enjoy narrativist games? How, exactly, are they harming themselves or others by playing games with their friends in the privacy of their own homes and enjoying that experience. Why is it important for you to stop people having fun in this way?Have you ever read about how storytelling works in oral tradition cultures? Some anthropologists make the argument that storytelling started as a decentred, unpredictable, multi-person activity and that our modern construction of stories with careful plotting and a single narrator only came later. Are you really taking the position that cultures like the Australian Aborigines don't tell stories?

You see, mythusmage, things seem very clear to you right now because you have never studied storytelling, RPG theory or anything else about which you have been issuing authoritative "proclamations" the past few days. Being ignorant is an easy way to make the world appear simple and easily definable.Actually, the purpose of RPGs is to get together with your friends and have fun. They have no grand social purpose beyond that because It's just a game, man.

The GNS Meme: My problem with the whole GNS things start with the fact it comes from certain starting assumptions. Assumptions I do not agree with. You appear to assume I'm a simulationist, when I've said nothing about simulating anything. To clarify, I've said nothing about how RPGs simulate life. I have said on a number of occasions that RPGs are like life for thus and such reason. That is, RPGs are an analog of life, not a simulation.

As far as I can see, the Narrativist meme is based on the supposition that RPGs are like, analogous, to stories. Since RPGs by their very nature cannot be like stories, the Narrativist Stance has no real validity. There are games that treat RPGs like story, but when you observe what goes on in a session you'll note that what happens is nothing like a story.

You get right down to it, those "Story Now" games you mention are nothing of the sort. They may use memes and tropes for stories, but properly speaking they are not stories. What they really do is model life, as the designer sees it, in a fictional world.

Studies: My statements re RPGs is based on first hand experience. I have found that relying on what someone else says about a phenomenon leads to error and misunderstanding. And that the conclusion arrived at very often depends on the author's starting assumptions.

Have the conclusions reached by those stuidies on story telling and RPG theory been tested? Or is it a case of, "That sounds good, we'll go with it."? Are they, in other words, good science?

Should be vs. Is: Sometimes things are what they are. African-Americans have dark skin. A fact that has lead no small number of people over the years to grossly underestimate African-American capabilities. A 'what is' leading to many a fallacious 'must be'. In the case of RPGs we get something that one could characterize as; since what happens in an adventure is imaginary, it must be like a story.

My argument is, no it doesn't. What we have with RPGs is something new. Something that is imaginary, something that contains what are by any definition fictional events, but is not a story. What happens during a session is make believe, and yet true. (Aint that a bundle of contradictions? ) I submit, sir, that by trying to make RPGs fit the story paradigm one is limiting what RPGs could be, and limiting enjoyment of the hobby. It is, in short, limiting the audience and thus limiting the viability of the hobby and industry.

 

[mythusmage]

This is demonstrably incorrect.

A few weeks ago, I was travelling with a couple of friends of mine, and their small child. The kid asked me to tell him a story.

I don't have a child. I don't have any children's stories memorized. So, I made one up. When I started, I did not know the plot, or the characters, or the setting, or the end point. I rattled off this tale completely extempore for about half an hour. Are you trying to tell me that since I had not pre-determined the plot, I wasn't telling a story?

If so, I submit that you are using a definition of "story" that is so counter-intuitive as to be useless.

Sometimes the plot is laid down before the telling, sometimes it's laid down during the telling. Now, while you were telling the tale when did the characters have any opportunity to change the course of events of their own accord?

Any writer who tells you his characters took over the story is selling you something. They took nothing over, he decided to change it.

 

[mythusmage]

When "I decide" happens, I'm inputting things into the game based on my own agenda, whatever that is. Sometimes that agenda is explicit, sometimes implicit. If I use "I decide" to dangle a plot hook in front of the players, that's more explicit than if I use it to say it's raining.

The Difference Between Story and RPGs

Story: What I decide happens is what happens.

RPGs: What I decide happens is what might happen, if luck falls my way.

 

[mythusmage]

Sounds like fun. I'll save discussion of how I read "metatextual" for later, except that as how I read it it can serve a similar function to Premise in Narrativist games -- themes informing and connecting the kinds of things that are brought up in the text(play).

Sorry for the snarkiness; I think the thing people are reacting to is mythusmage's tone of "This is how to play" rather than "This is how I enjoy playing". That rarely goes over well. But it makes more sense to have a meaningful discussion in the thread rather than complain about that.

Okay, Story Now is basically the idea that play can be made up of meaningful decisions and their consequences. The original theory defines "Story" as addressing a given theme, but that part isn't necessary. (Or we can define theme as something like "Adventurers fight evil"; same result.) So whatever our game is about, as it evolves through play, we'll call that story.

It's possible to play a Sim game where you just sort of trudge around the countryside, interacting with things as they come up. To the extent things come up, they're injected into the imagined landscape by the GM. He usually has a purpose to this, unless he's just rolling random encounters. Players get to make meaningful, big decisions from time to time, but maybe there's a lot of fighting orcs cause they're there, or buying supplies, or hanging out in taverns. I'll call that "Story Whenever", 'cause if you were to tell somebody about the stuff that happened in the game, you're kinda skipping the blah parts and getting to the parts where the PCs did something really interesting.

If you're going for Story Now, every session's going to have several places where the players had their characters make meaningful decisions. You're not driving for big, dramatic stuff every scene, but you're not playing out three days of overland travel either. Whatever the parts are that your group thinks are kinda blah, you gloss over them.

Okay, so Bangs and scene framing are tools towards that approach. A Bang is just a situation the GM presents that forces a meaningful decision. It's a question that can't be ignored, but doesn't have one right answer. (If the PC can ignore it, it's just an event; if there's only one right answer, it's railroading. Either way, not a Bang.) By "meaningful" I mean it makes a difference in how play proceeds past this point, and not just "I die or don't die".

Bangs are tricky to come up with. Attacked by orcs? Not a Bang if you have to fight them (not a choice), or if it doesn't matter if you fight them or run (not a meaningful choice). But "Orcs attack, and your old half-orc friend Grog is among them, and he's on their side" is a Bang. What's the deal here? Why's Grog with them? Do we kill them all, or try to kill everybody except Grog, or try to reason with him, or run away and worry about it later? Whatever choice they settle on is going to affect later play.

Scene framing is perhaps simpler. Mostly it's about thinking about what the conflict and the stakes are in the scene you want to set. It's definately about having a reason for a scene other than "some stuff happens." Lots of things happen off-camera in a movie, but we only see the interesting ones. That example Bang above frames a scene (there's a conflict and stakes), but you could also have a scene of the party traveling overland and just having a conversation for a while. The biggest thing here is developing a sense of both how to start a scene (what you want it to accomplish), and how to end it (when that's been accomplished).

Both of these techniques can work fine in Sim; to some extent, people use them all the time. Talking about them explicitly as techniques just makes it easier to discuss them.

I think it's interesting that both of these techniques could be described by some people as "railroady". Partly, that's because there's no clear definition of what railroading is. Both of them do limit player choice, I admit. But we're talking about constraining the ability to "do anything" in exchange for focusing play on "doing interesting things". They're really just ways of editing the in-game events to get to the good stuff. And because they're just techniques, you don't use them exclusively -- players can still propose actions during play, for example.

I do think it's interesting that you can use these techniques to create story, but that it's not a set story of the GM's creation. Every time you throw a Bang to the players, you're telling them, "Tell me where you want the story to go." You talk to your group, figure out the kinds of things they're interested in and enjoy, and drive play towards that kind of stuff.

I hope that gives some fodder for discussion. Like I said, they're just techniques, and different people will find differing utility in them.

I thank you for the explanation. Unless I'm utterly mistaken, it sounds to me like Story Now is one way to run an adventure. The group focuses on decision points and what happens next depends on decisions made and what happened as a result of those decisions.

Player: I fireball the dragon.

GM: The red dragon chuckles and wipes off the ashes on his hide. He then picks you up and flies off with you, telling the rest of the party, "He'll be back in a few days safe and sound. I just want to show him to my kids."

Far as I can see, something like "Decision Now" fits this style better than "Story Now". "Decision Now" in that the participants are making choice that could change things. "Could" not, "will" for things don't always work out as one hopes.

And for your information I've said nothing about how people play. What I'm dealing with is perception, with how people see what they're doing. How you play is your decision, and may you have fun with it. My posting is about how people see RPGs. Which can impact how they play when perception leads to misunderstandings about how RPGs should be played.

You wish to treat your game like heroic fantasy or supernatural horror, that is your business. RPGs as a life analogy does not forbid incorporating those memes and tropes you think belong in your game. Were RPGs an accurate model for real life you wouldn't have ghosts and ghoulies and goblin musicians from Brementown. But as an analog of real life you can have such things in your game.

Now RPGs can model real life in many ways, but because we can't know everything about how the real world works RPGs cannot simulate real life with any accuracy. And note that my definition of simulate is a lot more stringent than what others may use.

My goal is to change how people see RPGs, not how they play them. In the long run to improve the RPG experience, regardless of how you play.

 

[mythusmage]

Won't this discriminate certain settings, that gamers would prefer to avoid. Take for instance, a Lord of the Rings RPG (be it from ICE or Decipher). If you place a party of PCs during the time of the War of the Ring, won't they somehow feel like one of those non-speaking extras on the films because whatever they do may or may not impact upon the event simply because the spotlight is on the Fellowship and not them?

Or do you simply prefer the kind of immersion in which the event taking place in the setting is somehow affecting them and not the other way around?

In an RPG you're dealing with the world and not the story. The story is how things went in that particular version of the world. In your version things can (and likely will) go quite differently.

Really, when you start a game in Middle Earth, The Land, or Chicago it ceases to be the setting envisioned by the creator and becomes yours to do with as you wish. Subject to the actions of your players. You want to run a game where Sauron is Prince of Chicago, hobbits run specialty delis and tailor, and the Darklord is extremely allergic to white gold, I hope it goes well and your players have tons of fun with it.

When running something like the Babylon 5 or Stargate SG1 RPGs your goal is not to recreate the events of the series, but to present adventures set in the respective universes and give your players a taste of what life is like there.

Don't be concerned with fidelity to the narrative, be concerned rather with fidelity to the tone. It is far better to let the players become, if only for a little while, a part of the world than to make them recreate the tale with any accuracy.

Let me put it this way, your players kill Frodo and steal the ring guess who Sauron is now looking for?